About us

During the last half of the twentieth century, striking applications of Mathematics appeared in all natural sciences, even in behavioural and social sciences. From Life Sciences (DNA studies) to Information Technology (cellular phones, microprocessors, internet, GPS devices), from Theoretical Physics (fundamental structure of matter, gravitation, cosmos) to Geology (oil reserves), from Medical Technology (computerized axial tomography scanners) to Economics (stochastic and economic processes, finance markets), Mathematics had an ineradicable imprint on each part of modern science and everyday life. In shorter and shorter time intervals ideas and results developed in fundamental mathematics have crucial impact on science and society.

Mathematics is a universal tool to gain insight in highly complex systems. But mathematics is also a science of its own. It is highly alive, powered by its internal driving forces and by inspirations coming from new challenges in other fields.

The Mathematics Research Unit RMATH is internationally very visible through its research publications, its high number of conference and seminar presentations, and the many conferences and workshops that it organises. RMATH disposes of a large network of international collaborations of its members, as well as collaboration agreements (for instance, with the Mathematics Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Sciences (Steklov Mathematical Institute), the Mathematics Department of the Higher School of Economics, Moscow).

RMATH organises several weekly seminars, including the Mathematics Colloquium and the General Mathematics Seminar, which are open to researchers from other disciplines and the interested public. It also publishes the international peer-reviewed research journal Travaux mathématiques.

The Mathematics Research Unit is responsible for the Bachelor in Mathematics (part of BASI), the Master in Mathematics as well as for Mathematics courses in other programmes.

The Master in Mathematics programme is currently supported by two outstanding international experts, Pierre Schapira and Hans Föllmer. As a new innovative feature in teaching, RMATH has established the Experimental Mathematics Lab, enabling students to discover mathematics themselves, fostering their independence and maturity and leading the best ones to research questions already at an early stage.

RMATH devotes special attention to PhD education; it offers a stimulating and supportive environment to its early stage researchers and its more experienced postdocs. This is successfully demonstrated by the many permanent positions at leading international universities that RMATH's former junior members have obtained.